Blame Keith Giles and his twitter feed of 1sr May.
I have a tendency of blaming someone else for that which is my responsibility. I’m sure you’ve never come across that kind of behaviour before.
I follow Keith on twitter and also his blogging, cos I regard him as one of the best around. I love his posts and tweets – not because I agree with everything he says, but because he says it well and it certainly refers me back to Christ.
So he posts the link to the video above. I watch the video – three times – before electing to post it.
Jon Zens isn’t new to me because other guys I follow from a distance like Frank Viola refer to him, and having read some of his stuff, it does a good job in challenging me to find what God wants for His church.
In any case, the video is worth watching and considering the heart of his argument about the dangerous effect of the split in the contrast to the call for the priesthood of all believers. My favourite bit comes at 4:04 when he talks about the ordained as opposed to the rest who are … well you can hear it for yourself!
However, is the split at the root of the problem of church today?
For His Name’s Sake
Shalom
C. L. J. Dryden
Life With CD 
Hello Christopher. Thanks for connecting with me on my blog and Twitter. I found this Zen’s presentation to create the same type of false dichotomies that I have found over on Miguel’s blog. That is, if we have a clergy/laity split it means managing people and stifling the church. So the solution is to eliminate it based on select passages of scripture. This is creating an unfortunate and unnecessary divide and not taking into consideration the both/and of clergy/laity.. On one hand yes, we all do experience a priesthood of the believer who minister to each other. In this regard those tasked with the responsibility of the flock are not different or special but part of the body.
But on the other hand, I find it interesting that he says there is no scriptural warrant for those tasked with certain functions, like administration of the Word and Sacrament. How does one read 1 Timothy, Titus and 1 Peter 5 and come to that conclusion? I’ve asked Miguel to interact with those texts and he hasn’t yet. It also does NOT mean that pastors/elders are not part of the body. Of course they are. But they have responsibility for the flock that necessitates specific qualifications.
But I do note that Zen dismisses ministry of those functions as sacramental. I used to take that position but over the past few years have reversed it. It’s sacramental because its a means of grace God uses to strengthen the faith of his people. So I find Zen’s dismissal of it unfortunate as well.
Anyways, I hope that makes sense and didn’t ramble on too much. I wrote about this topic here.
http://theothoughts.com/2013/04/06/i-am-my-own-church-not-what-priesthood-of-the-believer-means/
Sorry, one more brief comment I meant to add in direct response to the question – is this the problem? No, the split is not the problem. I’d say its the abuse of the position and unreasonable expectations of pastors/elders that is the problem.